“And now, for my first trick, I’ll have Sailor Mars kill Nephrite’s guards over there.”
Nephrite crossed his arms over his chest and scolded his leader. “Stop kidding around, Kunzite.”
But the crimson warrior was already striding across the stone courtyard with deadly intent, raven hair tossed behind her by a sudden and angry breeze.
“Call her off, Kunzite. This isn’t funny.”
The five guards who protected the palace entrance turned towards the representative of the Moon Kingdom. Their hands eased towards the hilts of their swords and they exchanged curious glances at one another.
“They’re just common guards; it won’t be much of a loss.” Kunzite brushed it off easily.
Mars met the first of the men to step forward. By the time he’d unsheathed his sword, she’d already skirted behind him, placed soft palms on his scratchy cheeks, and snapped his neck in one, swift, violent motion. He hit the ground like a sack of potatoes.
With ashen faces, the other four charged simultaneously. Mars ducked. One soldier ran down another for her - unable to halt the forward momentum of his attack without Mars’ body in the way to take the blow. His comrade pawed at the spot where the blade impaled his abdomen. Mars was quick to snap the neck of her intended attacker before kicking the other soldier’s fallen sword off the ground and into her waiting hand with a precise ease.
She leveled the weapon at the two remaining guards who stood defensively - frozen and trapped by Mars’ empty, amethyst eyes. She charged, and made short work of them, felling both with one blow that opened both their necks effortlessly. Their blood left crimson splatters on Mars’ cheek that she didn’t bother to wipe away.
Zoicite whistled softly. “Didn’t even use her sword or her powers on them.”
Kunzite nodded slowly. “The Venusian was right. She really is a barbarian.”
’Venusian?’
The Martian’s body froze. The world as she had grown to know it - dark representations of her surroundings veiled in a thick, red haze - faded. Instead of the cold and lifeless bodies on the ground before her, she saw an image of the most beautiful blonde she’d ever seen.
And she felt at peace.
“Call her back.” Jadeite said uneasily.
“Fun’s over, Mars!”
The image of the blonde was stripped away. The crimson warrior tossed the dead guard’s sword to the ground where it landed with a clatter. She slowly returned to the leaders of the Dark Kingdom.
Where she sat under the shade of a generous elm, Queen Beryl crossed her legs and pressed a finger to her chin. Why had Mars obeyed Kunzite’s command? She was under no obligation to serve him. It struck her as strange from this woman who had initially resisted Metallia’s control so diligently, even in her unconscious state.
She smirked. Perhaps her hypothesis was correct. Perhaps the Martian harbored her own inherent darkness deep within her soul. Perhaps she wanted this.
Beryl, however, would never know that as Mars came to stand next to her side obediently, the crimson warrior had only one clear thought in her clouded mind, even if she wasn't entirely aware of its meaning.
‘Five less dark kingdom scum.’
Of all seven women assembled, none had found the courage to openly look another in the eye. There had been sideways glances, darted gazes, and fleeting looks, but there were still two unavoidable elephants in the room.
Firstly, the change in their Princess had caught everyone off guard. Serenity threaded idle fingers through one of her ponytails. There was a chilling determination in her deep, blue eyes. She’d had Endymion given to her, only to have him taken away again. It was cruel. It was harsh. However, his disappearance also had the opposite effect. She had not folded under pressure; in fact, she wanted to fight harder, to win him back. She’d already asked her senshi for extra training and was crestfallen to learn that she and her guardians were to be stuck in a meeting for the next several hours.
Minako was a different circumstance. The Venusian put up a brave front by masking her bloodshot eyes and puffy cheeks with too much makeup, all while holding her exhausted frame upright and stiff. She and Rei had had to fight for everything they’d come to share. Nothing had been given to either of them, and for her lover to be stolen away in the dark of night, from her own bed, was a heavy blow that she still hadn’t reconciled with. The others had never seen their leader become so unhinged. Only Rei had ever had such an affect on her, and without Rei there to have caused it, the effect was frightening.
Serenity and Minako were proof positive that people who are in love act strangely.
“Pluto?” Serenity asked, unable to tolerate the uncomfortable silence any longer. “I was unaware there was a senshi for the ninth planet.”
The tall, sapphire haired woman nodded. “Did you not find it strange that you hadn’t met the representatives of Pluto or Saturn?” She smiled indulgently and inclined her head slightly. “I’m sorry that our first meeting had to be under such circumstances, Princess.”
“Pluto has been working with the outers for some time now, but let’s hold off on the explanations until Rei and Endymion are here with us, ne?” The others couldn’t bring themselves to meet Minako’s forced optimism. “Besides,” Minako ruffled Serenity’s hair, “you don’t need more things to worry about right now.”
Serenity nodded and clutched the communicator Endymion had given her. It had been quiet ever since he had been stolen from the Moon. But she had not given up hope.
Minako turned to the herald of the Time Gates. With this stoic woman, who she knew had seen more than all the other senshi combined, Minako could allow her façade to slip in the slightest. She turned serious once more. “If you’re here, then Saturn-“
“No. Saturn has not been awakened. Not yet.”
“Not yet?”
“I… don’t think we can hold off much longer.” Pluto paused and captured Minako’s gaze. “Tell me what happened here last night.”
Minako looked to Makoto, and the Jovian fidgeted uncomfortably. “Mars, Endymion and I…” Makoto began haltingly, finding no small amount of interest in her hands where they rested in her lap, “we were all called to the pole.”
“By Beryl?” Minako asked.
“No… I think it was Metallia herself.” The Jovian suppressed a shiver. “When we got there, we found the Earthlings setting up an access point. The youma were already starting to stream through. Mars and I… we attacked. We were going to try to collapse the access point, to stall for more time against the Dark Kingdom, but…”
Ami laid a reassuring hand on Makoto’s thigh, and the Jovian’s shaky voice continued. “Endymion alerted us that Beryl would brainwash both Mars and I, and that’s when she… that’s when she trapped me in her burning mandala.” Makoto swallowed the lump in her throat. “She fought. She just kept fighting… but there were too many of them!”
Pluto stood. The Jovian had suffered enough. “And then they took Mars, but you escaped.”
Makoto looked away, her lips a thin, white line. She was a warrior. It was a soft spot. “She protected me, I think. Even after they brainwashed her, I was still protected inside her shield. It wasn’t until she left through the access point that the barrier faded. I… I wanted to stay and fight the youma. I did. But I knew I needed to get back to the palace to deliver the message…”
Minako rose and closed the distance between herself and Makoto. She rested a hand on her senshi’s shoulder. “You did what you had to do.” She said as bravely as possible.
The leader of the senshi cracked an honest half smile then, for she could hold onto that small hope that the Jovian had unwittingly given her, that Mars had retained enough of herself to keep Jupiter safe, even while being influenced by Metallia.
Minako slipped away from Makoto and cracked her knuckles. “I think it’s safe to assume that the Dark Kingdom plans to invade the Moon.” She could nearly feel the surge of protectiveness and battle readiness from her warriors. She turned to face them all coolly.
“What do you say we get the jump on them and attack first? If we crush their access point on our pole, we’ll at least buy ourselves more time against whatever it is Beryl’s planning.”
“Now we’re speaking the same language.” Uranus pushed herself off the pillar she’d been leaning against. It took only a few strides of her long legs to close the distance that separated her from Minako and she grasped the smaller woman’s shoulder and offered her a feral smile. “It’s the best plan I’ve heard since we got here.”
She’d definitely been here before.
Suddenly, Mars frowned. She turned on her heel and drew her sword, pointing it to the room’s entrance. A half second later, the door swung open wildly. A dark haired man stood panting in the opening. With a darted glance down the hall, he stepped inside and closed the door behind him before hurrying towards the crimson warrior. He seemed familiar, too, though Mars couldn’t place him.
“Rei!”
’Rei?’ The Martian’s eye twitched. Her red tinged world wavered just the slightest.
The Earthling rushed over to her side. Mars didn’t feel threatened by his presence, and she lowered her sword before sheathing it once more.
“Listen,” he said insistently, “Beryl’s going to send you back to the Moon.”
’The Moon?’
“I can’t imagine that Minako-san’s taking this any better than Serenity is right now.”
’Minako?’ Mars raised a shaky hand to her temple. There was that vision of the blonde again. Why did that woman seem so utterly important?
“All I can say is that I hope you’re being a damned good actress, Rei-san.” The dark haired man reached into his cape. In his hand, he fingered a finely folded piece of paper. “Mars, I don’t know what you have planned, but my communicator is broken and I need you to give this to Serenity-“
With a confused frown, Mars pushed the dark haired man back with a sudden, violent shove. The Earthling stumbled and retracted his hand back into his cape as though he’d been burned. He fingered the piece of paper impotently.
The door to the room opened with a low-pitched squeal. A man with long, white hair scowled at what he found.
“Endymion.” Kunzite spat. His boots quickened over the stone floor. His fingers clasped around Mars’ arm. She yanked her arm from his grasp and leveled narrowed, amethyst eyes at him.
Kunzite’s hands fell limply at his sides. He returned to the door. “Follow me.” He growled at her over his shoulder.
Mars afforded Endymion one short, critical glance before falling in behind the leader of the shittenou.
“Beryl has a mission for you.” Kunzite said smartly, eyeing the crimson warrior from the corner of his vision as he marched down the hall. He liked her obedience, and he sneered with satisfaction. “I told you you’d be on our side eventually.”
Mars frowned. Her pace slowed. The blank darkness inside her mind gave way to a scream that sounded so much like her own voice. It was disjointed, urgent, like something was wrong. But she was so confused. So confused. She remembered the name the man named Endymion had spoke, the name associated with the one woman she could remember. It was all she could think of.
‘Minako. Minako. Minako. Minako!’
Kunzite laughed. He tossed a hand over his shoulder in a flippant gesture. “You should have just chosen the easy way and surrendered when we had you here on Earth. Now your little Venusian will be in a world of hurt.”
The blankness disappeared from Mars eyes, the cloudiness giving way to piercing amethyst. Her pupils dilated, and with the scream of metal against metal as she drew her sword from its sheath, Mars leapt at the shittenou, driving him back against the wall.
Kunzite found himself in a position all too familiar, with the Martian’s blade pressed against his throat. The crimson warrior applied just the slightest amount of pressure, and he felt his skin give way to the blade’s paper-thin edge, felt his hot blood coursing a trail down his neck.
“That’s enough!”
Mars narrowed her eyes at Queen Beryl’s voice. She gave Kunzite one last scathing look and pressed her sword just a fraction of a centimeter closer before releasing the pressure on his neck altogether. Holding his bleeding neck with a gloved hand, Kunzite dropped to a knee in deference to his Queen. Swiftly, Mars turned her back on him and sheathed her sword.
Beryl walked around the crimson warrior in a close circle, eyeing her critically. “Are you ready for your first mission, Sailor Mars?” The Martian nodded. Beryl sneered. “I want you to go back to the Moon Kingdom tonight. I want you to kill Venus.”
Rei’s eyes wavered; the murky depths once again edged towards a violet hue and Beryl frowned. The Queen flexed her will, and in one, short moment, they clouded over once more.
“Yes, Queen Beryl.”
They were the first words the crimson warrior had spoken. Beryl smiled confidently and let her go.
Her warriors had left hours ago, on a mission to the pole, and she’d been forced to stay back with Pluto as her guard. She shot a weary glance to the closed door of her chamber, knowing that that enigmatic woman was just on the other side. Pluto was confusing. The woman seemed to speak in riddles, and it was more than the distraught Princess could handle at the moment.
She’d wanted to fight alongside her senshi, aide them in battle, but her plea had been issued on deaf ears. Despite the days of rigorous training she’s subjected herself to, her friends and guardians had made her stay back while they went into battle.
And she had to wonder if that what she’d always be to them - the helpless Princes who needed their protection above all else. She couldn’t help but wonder as her small hands balled into tight fists if they’d ever take her seriously. Her fingernails pressed into her palms hard enough to pull her back to reality, and her hand darted to the folds of her dress.
She clutched the cool plastic contours of the communicator Endymion had given her impotently, fighting to keep the tears that threatened from spilling down her face.
She collapsed onto her bed, her fingers flying over the well memorized keys.
-Endymion, please respond-
Serenity’s eyes were riveted to the chronometer on the wall. She’d force herself to wait a full five minutes for a response. She was acutely aware that in those five minutes, one of her senshi might be risking her life for her sake.
-Endymion!-
Two more minutes passed. She couldn’t be so strong. Her fingers danced across the keypad once again. Endymion could be risking his life for her, and she’d never know.
-Please. I have to know you’re alright-
Fifteen minutes passed. Small sniffles began to chip at the dam she’d so carefully built. Watery blue eyes looked out her arching windows to the glowing blue orb of the Earth, and with a single, hitching sob, Serenity gave in to her despair.
Venus growled. “Are you sure, Mercury?”
“Absolutely.”
“Then the youma will just have to do for now.” Venus’ gloved hands made tight fists. Slaughtering the youma hoard in the crater would only suffice until she could get her hands on the ones that took Rei from her. But at least it would be something to ease the pain. A cold, eerie wind howled restlessly.
“There are hundreds of times more youma now than when I left here last night.” Jupiter said darkly.
Uranus nodded grimly. “We might make a dent, but we won’t be able to push them back like we’d originally planned. There’s too many.”
“Mercury, if we can get in close enough, you can disable that access point, right?”
“Venus…” Mercury looked to her leader with a cautious eye, “we’d have to get really close.”
Cerulean eyes hardened. Fists clenched and unclenched.
“Venus?”
But out and over the edge, the leader of the senshi was already lost to the shadows of the crater’s wall, running down its vertical ledge recklessly.
Uranus looked back to the others. “Keep an eye on her.” She barked, and then she followed the Venusian headfirst into the crater, feeling the others right behind her on her heels.
Elemental attacks whizzed to the right and left of Venus. The ground rumbled at her feet, and she felt Uranus at her left. A surge of ocean water reared to her right and she knew Neptune was with her as well. The familiar spark of electricity and a menacing spray of water that tingled next to her were confirmation that Jupiter and Mercury were right behind her. Yet Venus wanted to be the first to meet the youma head on, and she appeased herself with a vicious swipe of her sword that opened ones neck and sent him tumbling to the ground in a spray of blood.
Slow and stupid, the monsters reared and sounded the attack. Their cumbersome bodies ceased their aimless milling, and their numbers slowly formed a more cohesive force, hundreds and hundreds of the creatures forming lines and marching to meet the threat of the five senshi.
Back to back, Neptune and Uranus launched long range attacks in tandem, careful to aim close enough to the leader of the inner senshi to reduce the number of youma in her immediate vicinity, all while eliminating dozens of their numbers with each attack.
Despite their massing numbers, the golden warrior only allowed herself to see one enemy at a time. Focus, defend, attack, kill, smile, and press on.
Venus only smirked when three youma surrounded her at once. They were a wall of flesh and ooze, a mass of teeth and claws. Dwarfing her small form, they were all she could see. One swiped at her with its short arms. She sliced through the appendages with her sword before driving her weapon into its throat. The other two seemed to learn and attacked together. One met its fate with a crescent beam to the brain, the other received the business end of her sword in the gut.
“Maa,” Neptune said between releasing long-range attacks, ”She’s getting a little cocky over there.”
“Let her.” Uranus barked as two of the monsters got a little too close for comfort. She rushed forward and tagged both of them through the neck with her sword. “She won’t listen to reason now. Let her work off some steam.”
With Jupiter as her cover, sending long-range bolts of lightening into the fray before the first lines had even neared their location, Mercury scrambled atop a rock formation. Gaining her feet, her blue visor came to life before her eyes and she scanned the enemy camp for their numbers and locations, their strengths and their weaknesses.
“Not good.” She said hurriedly. “Even Uranus and Neptune’s attacks can’t possibly reach the access point from here.”
“Oh?” Jupiter asked as she released another bolt of lightening. Ten youma fell to the ground in charred heaps. Their brethren were only minimally slowed as they clambered over their dead bodies. “Then we’ll just have to get closer.”
“Through all those?” Mercury asked. Jupiter only smiled up at her. With a knowing sigh, her blue visor disappeared. Mercury launched her small body off her perch and she landed nimbly next to her partner. Together, they rushed into battle.
A set of claws razed Venus’ shoulder and she hit the frost-covered ground hard enough to knock the wind out of her. From the corner of her eye, she could see the two outers and her two inners fighting effectively as teams. She was too slow to regain her feet, however, and she grimaced as the foot of a youma pressed down against her back. She found she very much missed fighting with Rei at her side. She coughed shallowly as her air supply diminished. What she’d give to have that fiery, confident reassurance next to her. The foot that pinned her down flexed, producing long talons that shot into the tender flesh of her side. Venus swallowed a strangled cry.
The ground beneath her body rumbled. A vicious wind and a golden glow stole the air and pushed her attacker off her prone body and cleared the general vicinity around her. She was suddenly aware of Uranus pulling her to her feet. Venus batted away the helping hands and found herself pushing her back against the Uranian’s form, not wasting any time in summoning her love me chain to attack four of the monsters that rushed in close to them.
From where she’d fallen back to aide Mercury and Jupiter, Neptune sent a Deep Submerge in her partner’s direction, taking out five more of the youma that charged the two senshi leaders. Uranus and Venus leaned against each other for support, each of them panting from their efforts.
“There’s no way we’ll make it to the access point, Venus.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“Fall back.”
The Uranian considered Venus’ small hesitation to be her approval.
“Never.” Venus’ raspy voice was nearly lost to the raging winds and the roar and constant shifting of the youma.
“Venus?” Uranus grabbed for the leader of the inner senshi.
But it was too late. She was gone. Venus was a flash of golden light, threading herself through the youma’s ranks. Her chain snaked out, taking down bodies to her right, working in tandem with her sword that dropped the youma to her left. Crescent beams felled the monsters that stood before her.
But they just kept coming.
A World Shaking cleared the path that had already closed in Venus’ wake and Uranus charged in with one target in mind. She grabbed Venus by the wrist. A Shabon Spray and an Oak Evolution kept the youma at bay for a short moment.
“What are you doing?” The Venusian barked.
“Calling a retreat. This is suicide.”
“If the outers want to retreat, that’s your decision.”
“I’m calling a retreat for the inners, too.”
“That’s not your decision to make, Haruka-san.”
“Have you even looked to your warriors, Minako?” Uranus barked, tightening her grip on Venus’ wrist. “They’re wounded and exhausted! They can’t keep this up and neither can you!”
Venus reluctantly looked to her senshi, barely visible through the shifting and scuffling of the monsters that surrounded them. Jupiter held a bloodied arm closely to her body. Favoring one of her legs, Mercury leant against the Jovian’s form, a trickle of blood running from a gash across her forehead. Even Neptune boasted battle wounds, a rapidly rising bruise above an eye and a cut lip.
The Venusian looked to the leader of the outers, that serious scowl compromised by a long, bloody gash that ran down an arm, and a blackening bruise that circled one hazel eye.
“Don’t make me remove you forcibly.” Uranus warned. “This isn’t what she would have wanted.”
The Venusian’s body went limp. She nodded her consent. Their comrades cleared a path for their escape. Venus offered little protest as Uranus pulled her back through the youma.
“I can walk by myself.” Minako spat.
Haruka hefted the Venusian’s petite form in her arms easily. “Some thanks I get for helping you, you little brat.”
Minako twisted her torso and slugged Haruka in the shoulder. Her weak punch had little affect on the Uranian and succeeded in only tugging at the stitches that lay beneath the Venusian’s bandaged side. She leant her head against Haruka’s shoulder in defeat.
“Are you quite done now?” Haruka asked scathingly. “That was some stunt you pulled out there, risking yourself like that.” She looked down at the limp woman in her arms. “You were no leader today, Venus.”
“’Ch.” Minako spat the familiar curse, but it only served to remind her of her missing partner, and she was forced to stifle a sob.
Haruka came to a stop in front of Minako’s door and eased the body in her arms to one side as she worked the doorknob. She strode towards the expansive bed, not bothering with the luxuries of turning on the lights.
“Regardless of what’s going on in your personal life, you can’t let it affect your leadership. Too many lives hinge on your strength, Minako.”
Haruka deposited the Venusian on the bed none too gently. Minako refused to make eye contact with her.
“For all you know, Rei is doing everything possible to get back here. You’d throw that all away and sacrifice yourself in a reckless battle?”
The Uranian took the Venusian by the shoulders. “Look at me, damnit!”
Haruka found herself regretting her words, for when Minako’s broken gaze finally turned in her direction, she had no recourse to the haunted pain she fond in the Venusian’s eyes. Haruka straightened stiffly and returned to the doorway, but she looked back one last time. Minako only stared at the ceiling blankly.
The Uranian frowned. ”I’m disappointed in you, Minako.”
Haruka shut the door behind her with a gentle click.
In the darkness near the window, a pair of cloudy, amethyst eyes narrowed. Her fingers possessed a white knuckled grip around the hilt of her sword, pointed downwards so as not to catch the glint of the blue and gold light of the Sun and the Earth that bled through the barely parted curtains.
She stepped forward slowly, intent on her target, but when one, retching sob seemed to unhinge the woman on the bed, filling the room with inconsolable sobs, she paused.
“Rei!” Minako wailed, face down and pounding at her pillow, “Where are you?”
Battling the haze that filled her mind, Mars hit the floor on one knee and one hand gripped her head. What was this confusion? Why did she feel like she was the cause of this woman’s pain? What was this sudden, inconsolable wrongness that surrounded her?
Mars stood. Her sword clattered to the floor. The crimson warrior turned, and she threw herself out the window.
Preview: Chapter 15: Home
Mars paced between the walls of her room in Edo Castle. The heels of her pumps tore ragged holes in the fine carpet that covered the polished wood as she furiously turned her body time and again.
The woman in that bed, back on the Moon… why could she see her in this bed here on Earth, her naked body wrapped tightly around one that resembled her own? Why?
She was supposed to have killed that woman.
But she hadn’t.
She stopped pacing. Her hands flexed, relaxed, and flexed again. Perhaps she should seek out Endymion, that man who seemed to know her. Perhaps he could-
Mars crumpled to the floor, hitting it with her knees and rolling on her side into a fetal position as the hazy, crimson veil that shrouded her vision flickered and faded to black. She felt icy fingers surround her soul and squeeze tightly. She stifled a cry until the pain receded.
Standing back up on shaking legs, the Martian warrior wiped a cold sweat from her brow. Cloudy eyes hardened, and with a newfound resolve, she left her room to resume her mission.
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